Nassau to Hatchet Bay to Little San Salvador to Staniel Cay

        We sailed from Nassau to Hatchet Bay on 12/12. Well, we sailed/motored due to not much wind. It was a sunny, beautiful, easy passage. We caught a Spanish Mackerel and enjoyed some fresh ceviche for lunch. Con also got his first haircut from me, he looks pretty good. The haircut was performed with the haircutee having dirty hair, him still steering Gualby, and with no comb; so all in all I think he looks damn good.
      When we arrived in Eleuthera we motored thru this very small opening in between two walls of rock to enter Hatchet Bay Pond. Allegedly this opening is 90 feet but it looked way freakin smaller. I asked Con a few times if he had the correct opening to the bay. He assured me he did. We made it thru unscathed and motored around the bay a bit before grabbing a free, covered in bird shit, mooring ball. Since the passage was so lovely and calm we started cocktail hour a wee bit earlier and it only took me three tries before I grabbed the bird shit covered loop on top of the ball and tied us up. I only lost the white handle to the boat hook; not the entire boat hook. Success!
      Our plan was to get up the next day, do some exploring and hopefully find a spot to maybe catch a few waves. Mother Nature had different plans. A knarly cold front came in with 30+ knots of wind, major waves/white caps even in a very well protected bay (thank goodness). We woke up to our canoe completely submerged and howling winds that made it an intense situation just being moored. So much for me improving my very minimal surfing skills. Not a good day to start! We wanted to give Eleuthera more time but we felt the need to keep moving. I feel torn between wanting to stay and explore the place where we are a little bit more and knowing that there are a million new and beautiful places waiting for me to explore. If I was in charge of planning our route and time managing how we will see it all, this adventure would be a 25 year voyage instead of 5 years. I know, you guys reading this are like, “Wow what a problem to have--you don’t think you are exploring everything as much as you would like because there are more countries that you want to see while you are traveling on your bad ass boat and not working.”
To be clear: Not complaining, just sharing
      So we pulled anchor at 4am, left Hatchet Bay behind us, and set course for Little San Salvador. Winds south/south east, seas less than two feet.  The start of a lovely day. It was a bit scary at the beginning, though, because it was so dark. I know this sounds obvious, but you can’t see the wind, the seas, or much of anything else at four in the morning with no moon. That feeling I guess is something I will just get use to with more experience.  I was pretty excited to see the sun rise that morning; for light and warmth. The cold front also brought in. . . cold air.

 During this passage we discovered a few things that I would like to share:

Gualby’s new sailing anthem: “Fuck You” by CeeLo Green
Favorite new breakfast: Steel cut oats with butter and honey
New shower technique: N/A its too cold
New lesson learned: Try really hard to not accidentally tack in a “Red Zone” (Red Zone=area where there is a high potential to run aground, ie on rocks, sandbars, and land in general)

      On our way to Little San Salvador we sailed all but the last 5 miles when the winds and waves got all confused and our sails were luffing and waves were hitting the bridge deck. Side note: We have also found that we get really excited when we are about 5-7 miles out and if the wind isn’t right where we want it we get ancy and want to motor.
      Little San Salvador is freaking beautiful. The water looks like pool water, the sand is so soft under our feet and there are, (to quote Shannon of the Salty Dog) a “butt load of coral heads everywhere!” Which brings me to my next self discovery:
      I have become a huntress. I have the blood thirst to spear and catch my own dinner. I speared my first grouper in little San Salvador and it was magnificent. Ok, well, maybe not magnificent because if you’ll notice I wrote I “speared” (not killed) my first grouper. I found him under a sponge house looking thing and was so excited. I went down, speared him, and thought, “wow that was easier than I thought. This is fantastic!” I then went to take my spear out of the hole to proudly show my husband how awesome I am at spear fishing and the grouper was not on my spear anymore. Luckily, Con anticipated my beginner skills and was already down re-spearing my grouper (this time all the way thru) and he brought it up to the surface. We decided that it was a “Gorham Kill.” Go team.
      We are currently anchored in between Staniel Cay and Big Majors Island in the Exumas. We are going to go explore The Thunderball Grotto today. The Thunderball Grotto is from one of the James Bond movies so of course I am going to wear my cutest, most bond-girl looking bikini. Its kinda chilly but I can't swim through thunderball cave in a lame-o wet suit. There are also “wild” pigs on Big Majors Island that are not so wild. They are kept fat and tame from all the tourists feeding them. I’m not sure how I feel about giving our food provisions to pigs. If we have any food that is “pig worthy” its already been given to Penny.
      Also, we know blogs are boring without pics. We have taken a bunch of cool photos but the internet is sooo slow trying to load them. I’ll keep on it.
M.

Ceviche!

This is the opening?!?

Going through the small opening, no sweat

It was a cold morning

The new faces of Freestyle Sailing

Pen Dog helping Meg stay on course

Just drying some peppers



No Meg isn't posing as a Bond Girl, she just swims prepared



Inside Thunderball Grotto



Curious Little Guy



Gorham Family Christmas Photo?